This Ganjifa painting depicts Lord Ganesha carrying his wife Siddhi. It is a painting that has been hand made by an artist in Mysuru, India.

There are over a dozen variants of Ganjifa. From the classic Mughal Ganjifa, to the Indo-Persian hybrid French Ganjifa, to the extremely rare Mamluk Kanjifa, to today’s somewhat popular Dashavatara Ganjifa made in Mysuru (Mysore). But basically almost all the sets fall under the 8 suit or the 12 suit category. It must be noted though that the Mysore Chad Ganjifa could sometimes have as many as 18 different suits containing 360 cards. The games played using this gigantic deck of cards can be found described in a book called Srittattvanidhi.

The cards that are currently being sold on The Lotus House’s site are categorized as either Mughal Ganjifa, the 96 card set or Dashavatara Ganjifa, the 120 card set. They are made in Mysuru, Karnataka. There are different styles made by artisans in Sawantwadi (Maharashtra), Puri (Odisha) and Bishnupur (Paschimbanga).